Magnapop Hot Boxing

Despite their relatively short time together on our big blue marble, Magnapop have already managed to play the UK's prestigious Reading Festival, crisscross Europe with Sugar, tour America with the Lemonheads, and achieve superstardom in the Benelux. But quite possibly, all of these accomplishments combined are eclipsed by their new disc, Hot Boxing (Priority Records), 14 songs that showcase Magnapop's ability to pull and twist infectious pop songs out of the air like balloon animals.

Linda Hopper sang in the Athenian jingle janglers Oh-OK and spent a short tenure in the band Holiday before growing disenchanted with the Georgia music scene. Around the same time ('89), Ruthie Morris moved to Atlanta from south Florida with a guitar, some strong notions about her next band, and the need for a collaborator. Introduced via mutual friends, the pair hit it off, and soon drew a mental schematic for the band they were destined to form, i.e., the aggression of hardcore but with warm pop melodies. Hopper and Morris then spent the next year fine tuning their material before drummer David McNair and bassist Shannon Mulvaney were added to the fold. The quartet went through a succession of name changes (all documented in their first single "Merry"), before settling on their apropos monicker.

After Magnapop's gig at the 1991 NMS, Ruthie passed out just one demo tape but fate dropped it into the right hands, coming in the form of two Dutch journalists from Oor Magazine. Word of the group circulated around Holland, and it wasn't long before Magnapop found themselves playing "The Year Punk Broke" festival at Rotterdam with Dinosaur Jr. and Nirvana. Their show in the small hall went over so well that the following day, Magnapop were invited to play after Smashing Pumpkins and before Sonic Youth on the big stage.

Since then, Magnapop have released two singles and an eponymous album, the latter a collection of early demos recorded from late 1990 to mid '92, with a few tracks produced under the watchful eye of Michael Stipe. The LP generated quite a stir in the UK music press, who gave the band extremely positive accolades, but also made no small light of the band's dual gender, and subsequently, felt the need to overwork some historiographical analogy including artists such as the Go-Go's and Blondie. To compound the whole issue, one nameless major label passed on Magnapop because their "female artist quotient was maxed out."

True, there are two women in the band...and yes, Magnapop do give a quick nod to their girl-pop luminaries, but it's more a reflection of their charisma and attitude. As far as fitting into some mysterious corporate bell curve that relates to nothing, Linda just takes it all in stride, laughing, "I wish all of our enemies could make it that easy for us," adding, "that kind of thinking is insulting because there haven't been enough women role models. People really like to focus on me and Ruthie. In her case, it's because she's a woman playing guitar and for some reason, that's perceived as very sexual. It's just a case of their limited perception."

It's unfortunate, because that short sightedness blots out the fact that when it comes to playing the guitar, Ruthie Morris is truly in a league of her own. You'd be very hard pressed to find anyone who can coax and throttle such insanely kinetic riffs out of a Fender Jazzmaster. (Juliana Hatfield was so taken with Morris' 6 string skills that she wrote a song, "Ruthless", about her.)

While Magnapop's previous disc (y'know, the one with the pumpkin on it) is a fine record, Hot Boxing is exponentially more confident, and filled from start to finish with plenty of pop smarts. That largely can be attributed to their maturation as a band, and to a lesser extent, the presence of producer Bob Mould, who twisted the knobs at Willie Nelson's Pedernales Studio outside Austin, Texas. The four members agree that working with Mould was nothing short of wonderful. "He just brought a sense of unity, like some sort of peaceful master," Linda pauses, then adds, "in a sense that he was nothing short of inspirational."

Mould kept Magnapop organized and focused, offering positive reinforcement and suggestions without resorting to strongarming, and the results are perfectly encapsulated on Hot Boxing's first single "Slowly, Slowly." Employing to & fro dynamics to a perfect T, the band rocks between deft lulls and an assaultive two chord crunch while Hopper's vocals are nothing short of effervescent. When she sings the mega-hook, "...do it all the time", you can practically see her smiling from ear to ear behind the microphone.

Hot Boxing. Simply put, it's a swell excuse to never venture far from your stereo. Now available on Priority Records.